New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 2, May, 1915 eBook

At D there are two woods; the southern we will call
No. 3, the northern No. 4. On the 16th our allies
got a trench just south of No. 3; they got into the
wood on the 18th, and fought backward and forward in
the wood that day and all the 19th and 20th; by the
evening of the 20th they had almost reached the northern
edge. On the 21st a stronger counter-attack than
usual was repulsed, and in pursuing the retiring enemy
they secured the northern edge. On the 22d there
was more fighting in No. 3, but in the end the French
managed to make their way into No. 4 as far as a trench
which runs along a crest midway through the wood.
The next six days saw continuous fighting in No. 4,
sometimes near the northern end, sometimes at the
crest in the middle, and occasionally back near the
southern end. The French now hold the northern
edge, and have pushed troops into the “Square”
wood just north of the line of the 25th.

At E again there are two small woods; these were both
captured on the 26th, but the trenches in the northern
one had been mined, and the French had no sooner seized
them than they were blown up. At F there was
another small redoubt; part of this was taken on the
19th from the east, but the work was not finally captured
till the 27th, when 240 corpses were found in it.
On the extreme west, at G, is a wood which has twice
been unsuccessfully attacked. On the first occasion
troops got into the wood, but a severe snowstorm prevented
the artillery from continuing to assist them, and
they were driven out. The second was an attempt
to surprise the enemy at 2 A.M. on the 25th; this
also failed. A third attack was made on March
7 and was successful; the French line now runs through
the wood.

The above will serve to show the tenacity which is
required for an operation of this kind. Up to
the present the French have made steady and continuous
progress, and their success may be best judged from
the fact that they have not been forced back on any
day behind the line they held in the morning, despite
innumerable counter-attacks. And this is not
merely a question of ground, but one of increasing
moral superiority, for it is in the unsuccessful counter-attacks
that losses are heavy, and these and the sense of
failure affect the morale of an army sooner or later.

Will the French push through the line? Will a
hole be made, or is the enemy like a badger, who digs
himself in rather faster than you can dig him out?
I cannot tell; it would indeed be an astonishing measure
of success for a first attempt, and the enemy may
require a great deal more hammering at many points
before he has definitely had enough at any one point.
But these operations have brought the day closer, and
turn our thoughts to the time when we shall be able
to move forward, and one finds the cavalrymen wondering
whether perhaps they, too, will get their chance.